


The Colour Blue

by Hail_Americas_Ass



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Powers, F/M, Marvel Universe, Natasha Romanov Feels, POV Natasha Romanov, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Post-War, Psychologists & Psychiatrists, Romanogers Appreciation Week 2020, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 03:08:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29039166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hail_Americas_Ass/pseuds/Hail_Americas_Ass
Summary: Natasha Romanoff returns from Afghanistan, she's lost the only family she had. The only thing that stops her from committing suicide is her next door neighbour who just happens to be a psychiatrist.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanov
Kudos: 30
Collections: Romanogers AU





	The Colour Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Hi. This is my first story on Ao3!

Blue.  
_/blu:/_

_1\. of a colour intermediate between green and violet, as of the sky or sea on a sunny day._

_2\. (of a person or mood) melancholy, sad, or depressed._

Blue.

A wonderful colour.

_"Natalia run! Keep going!"_

_A spray of bullets bit into the sand and snapped at our ankles like rabid dogs, barely missing. Crimson blood poured down the side of my face like a river of blood and rolled down my cheek but I paid no notice. A metallic taste poisoned my tongue, another wave of bullets rained down on us, a man on my right fell with a heavy thump and another on my left quickly followed suit. Soldiers fell like chains of dominoes. My senses were on overdrive, my boots pounded into the sand. A bullet whistled through the air and embedded itself into my calf, a choked scream tore from my throat as the pain raced up my leg..._

Commotion outside in the hallway startles me out of my flashback, adrenaline thunders through my veins, making me hyper-alert of a possible asailant, my eyes automatically dart around the room searching for potential weapons: a pen to stab, a book to block... before I realise that I'm back at home, in my apartment, safe and sound. No IEDs. No explosions. No guns. No enemy. No death. I'm ok... apparently.

At least that's what my therapist tells me 15 times each session.

" _You'll never be safe,"_ a nasty voice in my head tells me _._

"Shut up," I say firmly.

 _"You know we're right,"_ another voice chimes in. I ignore them and stir my steaming cup of coffee while gazing emptily at the white tendrils snaking upwards from my cup, vaporizing into the air of my apartment. It's always cold in here, not that I mind anymore. You get used to it.

_"We have a man down! I repeat! Man down!"_

_The rattling sound of gunfire which was followed by screams of both soldiers and civilians alike tainted the air, a woman sat against a building wall whimpering as she craddled her dead child in her arms, rivers streaming down both of her cheeks._

_"We need backup here!"_

But will I _ever_ be _okay_ again? After what happened?

My breathing calms slightly and my heart steadily slows its thundering rythm in my chest. A ball of blue yarn lies at my feet, a pair of knitting needles kneatly placed beside it. My hands tremble as they collect the needles and the ball of yarn off of the floor to start knitting.

W _h_ _at used to be a row of neat houses lay piles of calcined brick and disintegrated furniture, plumes of sand and dust engulfed the wreckage._

I can't do this anymore.

I discard the knitting needles and push myself up from the plush, comfortable warmth of the cushions. I make myself busy, hurtling across my apartment, snatching up my coat, boots and hat, slipping them on as I burst through my front door. I run like the wind down the stairwell of my apartment complex, bumping into someone as I go down (I couldn't wait for the elevator to arrive) into the underground carpark, where, upon finding my motorcycle, I swing my leg over the seat, start the engine and whizz through the streets at full speed, my flaming red hair streaming behind me, towards my destination.

• • •

  
Did you know that the colour blue activates a chemical in your brain which calms you? It's not working for me at the moment. My heart is pounding in my ears, throwing itself against my ribs, beating so fast as if it knows that its hosts time left alive was limited and was trying to fulfill the number of beats that would have been needed for an entire lifetime. My breathing is ragged, each breath drags rattling unwilling oxygen into my lungs.

My favourite colour is blue. It always has been, ever since I was a child. It was the colour of my first school uniform, it was the the colour of the first scarf I ever knit, it was the colour of my graduation robes. The dress I wore to my parents funeral was blue. Many people think that black should be the customary colour for mourning, but they don't know what black symbolizes. Black symbolizes death. Blue symbolizes sadness. Blue symbolizes loyalty. Loyalty that swears you'll never forget their memory.

Let me ask you something... how would you _prefer_ to die?

I'm quite sure the thought of flinging yourself off of a building into the dark murky abyss of death didn't cross your mind. I glance down at my numb fingers locked tightly on to the railing behind me and then down at my feet, the height is perilously dizzying but also perilously beautiful, forty floors act as a feeble barricade between me and the ground. Cars the size of ants crawl along tarmac ribbons that weave in and out and around the buildings, the side walks where people will be walking home are currently carpeted with a thin blanket of powdery pure white snow.

I'm scared, but I'm not. Does that make sense?

Blue.

That's the colour of the sky at the moment. A deep inky blue blanket littered with diamonds that wink and twinkle at me, candy floss clouds as pure white as the snow blanketing the rooftop I am standing on crawl across the sky. I used to stargaze with my twin sister Yelena, we would pull out the sunbeds from the garden shed and lay on them, counting the meteors zipping across the sky, or pointing out the creative constellations embellishing the darkness. My sister had countless constellations of freckles of her paper pale face, the most prominent cluster was located around her nose, we joked and called it the Milky Way Galaxy. My sisters favourite colour was blue. My sister is dead now.

" _It was yo_ _ur fault,"_ the voice reminds me, and I can't help but agree.

She stepped on a landmine. I was there with her.

Memories and thoughts zoom through my mind at the speed of light, demanding my attention and inevitably succeeding.

We had enlisted and trained together, we just wanted to serve our country. We were deployed to Afganistan. Where she would pay the ultimate price. It was just another reconaissance mission, a get in and get out.

Nothing we hadn't done a thousand times before, the dust and rock crunched under our heavy-duty military issued boots, with the punishing sun beating down on us and the sweltering heat, our thick camoflouge uniforms that covered every inch of our body were fighting a losing battle. I tugged at the collar of my uniform in a vain attempt to let cool air soothe my body, Yelena noticed and quirked a smile, a bead of sweat dripping down her freckle littered nose. I caught her eye and our smiles broadened until we both broke down into laughter, a flash of metal half buried in the sand beneath us caught my eye. _Landmine._

She was going to step on it. A warning tore from my lips but it was too late, time was not in my favour. Her foot landed true on the small metal object and it shattered into a million deadly pieces of light, shrapnel sprayed into the air as if they were bullets from the machine guns we held tightly in our palms. When the dust cleared and settled, my sister was laying in a pool of her own crimson red blood a few feet from the device that killed her, a ghost of her last smile still curling her full lips. _"Your fault."_

When I honourably discharged I wasn't expecting any side effects to my daring adventures of running into the face of danger, but there _was_ a side effect, something I was too heartbroken to realise. PTSD. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. A side effect of adventure.

Blue.

Nightmares infest my mind like a contagious deadly disease, flashes of gunfire, the enemy torturing me for months before I was rescued, explosions ripping through the air and my sisters last smile will wake me from my sleep, the blankets twisted around my body and restraining my limbs like a straight jacket, I jerk awake drenched in sweat, as if someone has thrown a bucket of water over me. Loud noises and sudden movements in public will startle me, a flash of bright light will trigger my immediate instintive response of 'fight or flight'.

Adventure is not so great when there are side effects.

Blue.

I wore the same blue dress for her funeral. I hope someone will wear something blue for my funeral too, not that there's anyone _left_ in my family except for my frail grandmother who doesn't remember me to be present. I imagine Yelena at my funeral, a blue tear will leak from her piercing blue eyes that I greatly admired all my life and trek down her cheek. I hope the sky will be blue. I hope the flowers they leave on my grave will be blue. A colour of loyalty. Loyalty that they'll never forget my memory. I wish my sweet sister to be the one to wear that blue dress.

But she's dead. Because of me.

My numb frigid fingers unlatch themselves from the railing and I prepare to let myself fall forward. I imagine the wind whistling in my ears as I plummet to the ground and hurtle like a meteor to the sidewalk.

Adventure is not so great when there are side effects.

A wonderful colour.

Blue.

The door to the roof behind me bursts open with such force it bounces off the wall with a loud bang.

"Wait! _Stop!_ Don't do it!"

I snap my head round go face the voice, nearly losing grip on the freezing railing as I do so. I wobble and regain my position, precariously perched on the ledge. Familiar ocean blue eyes wide with panic greet my lucid green ones, golden locks of hair flops down onto his forehead, the way his chest rises and falls rapidly and his puffy breaths show that he must have run up the stairwell to get to me, he's doubled over with his right hand poised in the air in a peaceful gesture.

"Don't jump. Please."

He stands straight and cautiously approaches me, timid footsteps gliding across the tiled roof. "Leave me alone," I say firmly, my breath condensing into a steamy cloud in the freezing air. His ocean blue orbs bore into mine, gaze so sharp that they feel as though they pierce through me. I find myself transfixed by the colour, the exact shade and how thin streaks of green stripe through the blue, like seaweed in an ocean. Stop. You're here to commit suicide. Not fall in love.

Did I just say _fall in love?_ Nope. Definitely not.

I'm so distracted by my thoughts that I don't realise that he had continued approaching me and was now within arms reach. Shaking my head, I snapped back to reality.

"Leave me alone," I repeat, but this time, the strength in my voice falters. I feel small, like when I was being tortured; no courage left to fight back and no strength left to keep going.

"No. You need help. How do you think your family would feel about losing you?"

"They're all dead," my eyes start to sting as tears accumulate rapidly, my arms start shaking and the voices in my head start screaming at me to jump but... I can't because I'm trapped in his deep blue eyes.

 _"Do it!"_ The voices yell. This time, I listen. I let go of the railing before he replies, my body just nearly tips over the edge when I feel _his_ arms wrap around my body and pulling me forcfully back onto the rooftop. As if my limbs were acting on instinct, my arms wrapped around his body and _let_ him drag me back. He stops pulling me once we are a good distance away from the railings, by now the tears have started to flow and won't stop, now I'm outright sobbing. He sweeps a warm hand up and down my back comfortingly.

I pull away reluctantly, "who are you? I swear I've seen you before."

He sheepishly rubs the back of his neck before responding, "I'm your neighbour on your floor. We met when your cat--Liho was it?-- managed to break into my apartment a few weeks ago and you had to retrieve it. I'm a psychiatrist so I noticed that you weren't thinking right when you bumped into me on the stairwell and left the building so I followed you."

I nod. None of us speak, akwardness solidifying the air while we think of a way forward. He speaks first, grasping my attention again, "I'll walk you back. Make sure you won't do anything stupid."

"Thank you."

The trip down to the lobby of the building carries out in silence.

♦♦♦

Few days later

  
Shrill ringing from my doorbell echoes throughout my apartment, I trudge dejectedly to the door. I ease it open gingerly and to my suprise Steve is standing there. He is standing awkwardly, shifting his weight from one leg to the other while a blush swifly dusts his cheeks and creeps under his shirt.

"Hi."

"Hello. Um- I know this is a horrible time and situation to ask but- I was wondering we could meet sometime for coffee or something?" A dark blush dusts his cheeks and ears again as he says so, theres hope in his eyes.

  
Am I suprised? Yes. Am I saying no? Hell no. "Okay. Monday morning?"

  
"Monday morning it is."

He flashes me a gentle smile before turning to walk away with a slight skip in his step, and I close the door.

Needless to say, it was a pretty good end to a pretty horrible week.


End file.
